By their own admission, Idles were pretty ropey when they first started back in 2012.

But hard work and a conscious effort to lay off the booze a bit have seen them make giant strides.

The Bristol quintet’s debut album, Brutalism, received critical acclaim after being released last year and added to their steadily-growing fanbase.

Politically and socially aware, and variously described as punk and post-punk, Idles aren’t afraid to add a bit of humour to the mix, and Essex fans got the chance to find out from themselves recently when they visited Chinnerys in Southend.

The gig went down a storm and, as they work their way through series of festival dates, they've also announced a tour of far bigger venues including the 02 Forum in Kentish Town on October 18 - a short and easy hop for anyone keen for more after seeing them in Southend.

“When we started out I just wanted to make music and work hard and see how it went,” said singer Joe Talbot before the Chinnerys gig as we discussed the band’s beginnings and where they could find themselves.

“We set ourselves realistic goals and work hard at achieving them. There’s no end product, we just want to keep on working hard and doing that.”

With its fiery feel and stark, honest lyrics, Brutalism was described as “sheer bleak beauty” by Louder Than War and is testimony to that work ethic.

“You’re looking at five people trying to understand each other and work together as a unit,” explained Joe.

“When we first started we were ****ing terrible. We were drinking all the time, and other stuff, but now we are a unified band and we’ve learnt how to work together.”

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They’ve also managed to create a distinctive sound that’s far from being ****ing terrible – exciting, volatile and uncompromising, it’s got the ingredients that a lot of punk bands these days seem to be lacking.

Is it punk though? Or post-punk?

“I’d just call it Idles,” insists Joe. “But of you want to find somewhere to categorise it. I’d put it somewhere between punk and post-punk. It’s happy, angry, violent music, that’s full of passion and compassion.”

Despite the band’s no-nonsense approach to politics and society, it’s not all doom and gloom with Idles.

Their clever lyrics make good use of humour. For instance, November 2016’s Well Done, which reached No 1 on Spotify’s viral charts, which has Mary Berry and a fictional toff called Tarquin down as reggae fans while making a deadly serious point about the class divide.

Humour is a big part of my life,” says Joe, “I like to make my friends laugh,

“Comedians like Chris Morris, Armando Iannucci and Stewart Lee are some of the greatest spokespeople of our generation. They’re far more relevant than anyone who works on The Sun.”